At present, the International Business Machines Windows Keyboard (IBMW Keyboard) is the standard keyboard used with computers. The construction of this keyboard is followed by all manufacturers with minor variations depending on additional features included and the specific field of use of the keyboard.
The IBMW Keyboard being a product evolved over time, its design and keypad construction are not conceptualised in a holistic manner taking all aspects into consideration ab-initio. As a result, the construction of the IBMW Keyboard is neither systematic nor logical and does not take into account several ergonomic aspects. Therefore it has a large number of deficiencies, of which some major ones are as under:—                (a) The size of the IBMW Keyboard is so large that all the keys on the keyboard cannot be operated without moving the hands from their natural resting position, particularly the numeric keypad, the arrow keys and other keys located on the right side of the keyboard.        (b) Due to its large size, the keyboard does not fit into the field of view of the operator when he is looking at the display screen of the monitor.        (c) The standard shape of the IBMW Keyboard is rectangular with the keys in a straight line whereas the natural resting position of the hands is tilting inwards approximately 25 degrees to the vertical running away from the operator. This makes typing on the keyboard with the hands kept at right angles to the keyboard a stressful process.        (d) The construction of the keyboard is not symmetrical about the centre. This leads to asymmetrical tasking and movement of the hands.        (e) The alphabet keys in the three rows and the numerals on the top fourth row are not aligned in a vertical line one below the other. There is a stagger between the rows with the second, third and fourth rows slightly to the right of the one above. This stagger is neither uniform from row to row nor is it symmetric about the centre. The stagger was necessary in mechanical typewriters but have no relevance in electronic keyboards.        (f) The numeric keypad with mathematical operators is located to the right side of the main keyboard. To use these keys, the user has to move his right hand 18 cm to the right. Though there is also a second set of numerals and mathematical operators above the alphabets, the mathematical operators are not arranged in any logical order.        (g) The pointing device or mouse is not part of the desktop keyboard. To use the mouse, the right hand has to move 25 cm to the right or the left hand has to move 18 cm to the left from the alphabet keys depending on which side the mouse has been placed.        (h) The typing task performed by the hands especially the fingers are not based on their relative capacity to do work. This has resulted in a workload allotment that is not optimised, thereby overworking some and underutilising some fingers.        (i) The standard alphabet keypad of the existing IBMW Keyboard is the QWERTY Keypad ((Inventor Christopher Latham, Sholes U.S. Pat. No. 207,559 issued on 27 Aug. 1878, see FIG. 1). This QWERTY Keypad was adopted for the early mechanical typewriters in the 1870s. Its primary aim was to keep the most often used keys well apart, so that the hammers which imprinted the images on the paper, when struck in quick succession did not stick to adjacent hammers. It was intended to deliberately reduce the speed of typing; a limitation imposed by the technical requirements of the time. The major drawbacks of the QWERTY Keypad are:—                    i. The allotment of typing workload to the fingers is not according to their relative capacity to do work. Similarly, the distribution of work to both hands is also not according to their relative capacity to do work.            ii. The construction of the punctuation and symbol keys are not based on any logic. Further, to type the symbols the Shift Key has to be used, thus making even typing the frequently used symbols difficult.                        
Thus the conventional IBMW Keyboard is neither systematic nor logical. As a result, it does not lend itself to speed in typing, is not easy to use, is not easy to learn, is prone to errors and causes medical problems on prolonged use. Ergonomically too it is not a satisfactory device. It also does not have a standard dimension or construction between desktop computer and notebook computer keyboards. All these deficiencies together make it a very poorly constructed device.
However, billions of users of the IBMW Keyboard have no other option but to use this keyboard there being no ready alternative. Over the years many new keypads both in the overall construction and in the character key construction have been suggested but none of them have had universal appeal to be adopted as a new standard. Many of the improvements were only rearrangement of character keys on the existing construction of the IBMW Keyboard such as the DVORAK (U.S. Pat. No. 2,040,248), Wedding (U.S. Pat. No. 7,137,749), and COLEMAK Keypad (not patented: refer http://colemak.com/). There were others which aimed at changing the way the entire keyboard was laid out; such as the Harbaugh (U.S. Pat. No. 5,584,588) and Yan (U.S. Pat. No. 6,241,406: see FIG. 2) Computer Keyboards. However, these keyboards did not address all the issues concerned and some were far too radical to be appealing to the common man and compounded the existing problems rather than resolve them.
According to estimates, the World has over one billion PCs as of end 2009. This is expected to double by the year 2015. Of the existing PCs, about 180 million PCs would also soon become obsolete and would need replacement along with their keyboards. This implies that there will be at least 1.18 billion new PCs to be introduced into the environment in the next six or seven years along with keyboards. In addition, there will be users who would choose to replace their existing keyboards both on PCs and also other devices where keyboards are used, when a new keyboard is introduced.
However, all of the current and future keyboard users of whom a large proportion will be children and first time users have no choice but to use the existing keyboard for the rest of their lives; a keyboard that was neither developed logically nor following any, ergonomic principles and is mostly based on the QWERTY Keyboard designed for the early mechanical typewriter and patented in 1878 i.e. over 132 years ago.
Therefore, there exists a need for a new keyboard or data entry device which is systematic, logical, and ergonomic in design and consequently is easy to use, easy to learn, increases the speed and reduces the possibility of medical problems in prolonged usage and is independent of the technology available now or in the future.